Original drawing (230 × 175 mm) on artist’s board (267 × 188 mm), fine ink and watercolour, signed (“Arthur Rackham”) lower right, mounted, framed, and glazed (framed size 373 × 315 mm). Pencil margins below mount; a vibrant and fine watercolour. ¶ Fred Gettings, Arthur Rackham , 1976; James Hamilton, Arthur Rackham: A Life with Illustration , 1990. £50,000 [154967] 109 RACKHAM, Arthur (illus.); ANDERSEN, Hans Christian. “The boat rushed on; the rat followed, gnashing its teeth”. 1932 Reworked and embellished original artwork Published within Rackham’s illustrated edition of Hans Andersen’s Fairy-Tales in 1932, a work described by Hamilton as “ideal – even the classic – late Rackham”. This drawing was originally reproduced on page 125 as a black and white drawing for “The Steadfast Tin Soldier”. The publishers of the book sent Rackham and his wife to Denmark for a week in November 1931 “to collect Danish atmosphere for the book”, as stated by Hamilton (pp. 144–5). In a letter Rackham wrote that “Copenhagen is a very beautiful city. Lots of water, ships, fishing boats, quays – everywhere . . . It is rather fatiguing to me. I have to talk so much and behave myself so well all the while taking notes and notes for dear life”. Ink and watercolour drawings generally command higher prices than pen and ink drawings. Rackham, ever the commercial artist, frequently reworked his black and white drawings and, as in this example, occasionally added detail. The published version shows the steadfast tin soldier in a paper boat. The reworked illustration has indistinct lines of newsprint added to the boat made out of a piece of newspaper. Original drawing (234 × 233 mm) on card, laid down on artist’s board, ink and watercolour, signed (“ARackham”) lower left, mounted,
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framed, and glazed (framed size 402 × 397 mm). ¶ James Hamilton, Arthur Rackham: A Life with Illustration , 1990. £27,500 [154955] 110 RACKHAM, Arthur (illus.); ROSSETTI, Christina. “Laura would call the little ones”. 1933 Original artwork for Rossetti’s poem Published within Rackham’s edition of Christina Rossetti’s Goblin Market in 1933. This fine watercolour appears opposite page 44 and is one of the four colour plates. Rackham’s work for Harrap in the 1930s saw a return to the artist’s early style. Fred Gettings in an essay on “Rackham’s Best Book Illustrations” states that Goblin Market “might easily have become an exercise in grotesqueries” but that Rackham’s work “has been infused with a delicacy of feeling and humour which touches the poem’s own qualities very well, but here we have all the elements of early Rackham” (p. 162). Original drawing (250 × 160 mm) on artist’s board (259 × 177 mm with “Smith’s Specially Prepared Boards” printed on reverse), fine ink and watercolour, signed (“Arthur Rackham”) lower left, mounted, framed, and glazed (framed size 404 × 317 mm). Fine and unfaded. ¶ Fred Gettings, Arthur Rackham , 1976. £20,000 [154994]
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108 RACKHAM, Arthur (illus.); MOORE, Clement C. “Filled all the Stockings”. 1931 The artist’s original artwork for a Christmas classic Published within Rackham’s edition of Moore’s The Night Before Christmas in 1931. This fine watercolour of Father Christmas
is one of four colour plates in the book and appears on page 31. Fred Gettings found that Rackham’s watercolours for the work had “a vitality and charm which is lacking in many of the pictures produced by Rackham during that time” (pp. 161–2). Writing to E. A. Osborne in 1935, Rackham recalled that the limited edition of the book sold out and “there was quite a fight over it. America went very strong for it” (Gettings, p. 142).
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All items are fully described and photographed at peterharrington.co.uk
CHILDREN’S BOOKS & ORIGINAL ARTWORK
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